Xendit takes full control of Malaysia's Payex, rebrands as Xendit Malaysia

Indonesia-headquartered payments unicorn Xendit has completed the full acquisition of Payex, a Bank Negara Malaysia-licensed payment gateway based in Kuala Lumpur, the company confirmed in a press release. Payex will trade as Xendit Malaysia, giving the regional player a local BNM licence under which to consolidate its Southeast Asia operations. Since making an initial strategic investment in Payex in early 2023, Xendit has onboarded more than 4,500 Malaysian businesses and processed over RM5 billion (around US$1.1 billion) in payment volume. The deal marks the latest in a wave of cross-border fintech consolidation in Malaysia, where BNM-licensed gateways remain scarce and strategically valuable.

The deal

Xendit did not disclose the acquisition price, but the structure of the transaction has been laid out across a series of filings and press communications. The Indonesian firm first took a strategic stake in Payex in early 2023, using the home-grown gateway as a regulated entry point into the Malaysian market. Over the following two years, Xendit built out a local team, integrated its technology stack with Payex's BNM-licensed infrastructure, and processed RM5 billion in total payment volume through the platform. The full acquisition, completed in 2025, now consolidates 100% ownership under Xendit.

Payex operates as a payment gateway regulated by Bank Negara Malaysia under the Financial Services Act 2013, one of only a handful of foreign-controlled licensed gateways in the country. Following the deal, the entity will trade as Xendit Malaysia, with its local licence intact and its merchant base absorbed into the regional platform. Jayson Poon, a former central bank official, has been installed to lead the new entity.

The transaction is not subject to a separate antitrust review because Payex's revenue falls below the merger-notification thresholds under the Malaysia Competition Commission Act 2010. Regulatory approval was limited to BNM's change-of-control sign-off on the gateway licence, which Xendit has already secured. Funding for the buyout was not disclosed but is consistent with Xendit's broader regional expansion capital, which has been supported by ACV Capital and other regional investors since the company's unicorn round.

Why this matters

The acquisition closes a two-year build-up that turned a strategic minority investment into a full regional beachhead. For Xendit, the deal is the third leg of a wider Southeast Asia expansion that already includes the Philippines, where it integrated Dragonpay in 2025, and Thailand, where it entered in 2024. Malaysia gives the Indonesian firm a BNM-regulated payments licence in the region's third-largest economy, a position that is hard to replicate through greenfield entry. The five BNM-licensed digital banks, including Boost Bank, do not directly compete with Xendit on payment-gateway services, so the deal is incremental rather than duplicative.

For Malaysia, the move underlines a broader pattern of regional fintech consolidation in which larger ASEAN players absorb local gateways to obtain licences and merchant rosters. The pattern mirrors deals in Thailand and the Philippines, where Indonesian and Singaporean firms have used M&A to clear local regulatory hurdles. For Malaysian investors watching the sector, the implication is that mid-tier payment gateways are increasingly the targets of cross-border strategics, and valuations are likely to anchor on licence value rather than just transaction volume. The same logic has priced recent ASEAN fintech M&A in the 3-5x revenue range, even where the acquirer is regional rather than global.

Xendit's own figures also offer a benchmark for what scale looks like in the local market: 4,500 Malaysian businesses onboarded and RM5 billion in processed volume over roughly two years. That is a useful reference point for any Malaysian founder weighing a sale to a regional consolidator against holding out for an independent path.

What's next

Xendit Malaysia is expected to expand its local team, deepen partnerships with Malaysian e-commerce platforms, and roll out the regional technology stack across FPX, DuitNow QR, e-wallets and cards. The company is also signalling educational initiatives aimed at SMEs, a market segment it sees as underserved by the existing gateway landscape. Watch for follow-on regional M&A in the second half of 2026 as the next payment gateways come up for sale, particularly in Vietnam and the Philippines where Xendit's footprint is thinner.

Source: Xendit